All that it is necessary to know of Hilda's return letter to Peter ran as follows: "My Dear Boy, "Your letter from Abbeville reached me the day before yesterday, and I have thought about nothing else since.

It is plain to me that it is no use arguing with you and no good reproaching you, for once you get an idea into your head nothing but bitter experience will drive it out.

But, Peter, you must see that so far as I am concerned you are asking me to choose between you and your strange ideas and all that is familiar and dear in my life.

You can't honestly expect me to believe that my Church and my parents and my teachers are all wrong, and that, to put it mildly, the very strange people you appear to be meeting in France are all right.
My dear Peter, do try and look at it sensibly.

The story you told me of the death of Lieutenant Jenks was terrible--terrible; it brings the war home in all its ghastly reality; but really, you know, it was his fault and not yours, and still less the fault of the Church of England, that he did not want you when he came to die.